How MassHVAC Verifies Its Numbers

What we publish (and what we don't)

We publish: current Mass Save rebate amounts and eligibility rules, federal program status, refrigerant rules and HPQPL listing requirements, sponsor utility mappings by Massachusetts city, climate-zone reference temperatures, and the procedural sequences for booking assessments, claiming rebates, and getting installs done. We tie every dollar figure to a dated primary source.

We do not publish: fabricated reviews, made-up customer counts, invented installer credentials, fake "years in business" claims, or undocumented industry assertions. We are a Massachusetts HVAC installation service delivered through our partner Comfitrust; we are honest about that and we do not invent operator credentials we don't hold.

The primary-source standard

Every factual claim on this site must trace to one of these source categories:

• Mass Save program documentation at masssave.com — the Air Source Heat Pumps page, Heat Pump Qualified Products List, HEAT Loan terms, Enhanced rebate page, IRA programs page, sponsors page.
• Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources at mass.gov/doer — for state-level program decisions and DPU filings.
• Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities filings — for sponsor utility territory boundaries and program-administrator orders.
• IRS at irs.gov — for §25C, §25D, and other federal tax credit status.
• Congress.gov for statute text and bill status (e.g. Public Law 119-21 / OBBBA).
• U.S. EPA at epa.gov — for refrigerant transition rules and the GWP-700 cap.
• ENERGY STAR at energystar.gov — for product certification status and Cold Climate (ccASHP) specifications.
• ASHRAE Climatic Design Information — for the 99% winter design temperatures we cite for each Massachusetts city.
• U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts — for the city population and demographic figures.
• HUD Area Median Income data — for the 80% AMI thresholds we cite for HEAR eligibility.
• Individual utility company sites (eversource.com, nationalgridus.com, unitil.com, capelightcompact.org, libertyutilities.com, berkshiregas.com) — for sponsor territory verification.
• City and town official .gov sites — for permitting office names, historic district reviews, and local noise ordinances.

Secondary commentary from industry blogs, aggregator sites, and AI-generated summaries is not used as factual reference material. We may cite secondary sources only when they themselves cite a verifiable primary source and we've followed the chain.

Verification cadence

• Before any publish of a new page or significant revision: re-verify every dollar amount, date, and program rule on the page against current primary sources.
• Quarterly for the entire site: scheduled re-verification of all incentive figures, refrigerant rules, and federal credit status.
• Annually in January: comprehensive re-verification of all Mass Save figures (rate-year changes typically take effect January 1).
• Ad-hoc when news breaks: legislation (e.g. the OBBBA in July 2025), DPU orders (e.g. the February 2026 $500M plan reduction), or program announcements trigger immediate review of affected content.

The incentives changelog is the dated record of every program change we've tracked since 2025 and every site-wide verification cycle. The LAST_VERIFIED date displayed on every rebate-related page on the site corresponds to the most recent verification cycle. For the full catalog of every primary source we cite (Mass Save, MA DOER, IRS, EPA, DPU tariff filings, ACCA, IECC), see the Primary Sources page.

Why we date every figure

Massachusetts heat pump rebates have changed annually for the past three years. The §25C federal credit was extended through 2032 under the Inflation Reduction Act and then terminated early by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. R-410A refrigerant transitioned out of the HPQPL on a specific date. Sponsor utility footprints shift when companies merge or acquire (Eversource acquired Columbia Gas of Massachusetts in October 2020 — Brockton and Springfield are now Eversource Gas, not Columbia or National Grid as some stale sources still report).

Undated figures are a trap. A "current" rebate amount published in 2024 is wrong in 2026. Every dollar amount on this site carries a verification date so you can decide whether to trust it for a decision you're making today.

Corrections policy

If a figure on this site disagrees with the current primary source, the primary source wins. Tell us about it via the contact page and we will:

1. Verify the discrepancy against the primary source within 48 hours.
2. Update the affected pages.
3. Log the correction in the incentives changelog with the date, the source we cross-checked against, and what changed.

We do not silently update content — corrections that materially change a figure (rebate amount, eligibility threshold, federal status) are publicly logged.

Our position on AI-generated content

We use AI tools as part of our editorial process — primarily for research synthesis, draft scaffolding, and consistency checks across the site's 150+ pages. We do not publish AI-generated drafts without a human editorial pass that verifies every factual claim against a primary source and adds the Massachusetts-specific information gain that distinguishes this site (sponsor utility detail, climate-zone reference temperatures, historic district considerations, real worked cost math).

We allow AI crawlers (GPTBot, ClaudeBot, PerplexityBot, Google-Extended, and others) full access to the site through robots.txt — see our llms.txt for the AI-friendly summary of the site's purpose and structure. We believe accurate, sourced Massachusetts HVAC information should be available for AI engines to cite as readily as for human readers.

What this means for you, the reader

• Any rebate amount you see on this site was true on the displayed verification date, sourced from a Mass Save / IRS / EPA / mass.gov primary reference.
• If a program has changed since the displayed date, we either updated the page or we'll fix it the next verification cycle — and the change will be logged in the changelog.
• If you spot something stale, we'll fix it on contact. Email or phone via the contact page.